I'd rather die
by muyany
Summary: A sad attempt at humor. No one gets out of Mandos' Halls unchanged. Actually Oropher is the main charcter but he isn't in the list, though Gil-galad is in it of course.


_Something silly I came up with one day and then got carried away with.  
Disclaimer: none of this is mine. _

_Lissuin is a flower, just look it up on Wikipedia. _

**I'd rather die.**

Frustrated Oropher threw the magazine on how to take care of lissuin back on top of other papers which were also mainly on gardening. He stared at it in the vain hope it would spontaneously combust and alert someone to his boredom. It didn't work. He heaved a sigh and drew breath for a second one, but getting some annoyed glances from all around he opted for pressing his fist to his mouth instead. He was hard pressed not to start biting at his knuckles. He glanced around to see if he was still getting any suspicious looks.

To his left two elves were leaning backwards, trying to count the dots on the ceiling. The elf to his right looked to be asleep, though he might just as well have died of boredom. Across the low, endlessly long table one elf was looking at his shoes. Probably he is still in shock, Oropher thought. Looked over at the elf's number, he figured he was right and nodded in satisfaction. A ripping sound a little down the line caught the attention of every elf, except the one staring at the mud on his boots. An elf with brownish red hair looked intently at a colourful strip of paper he's ripped from a magazine –no doubt on gardening- but looked up when he felt hundreds of hostile eyes on him. He smiled apologetically and shyly waved before throwing down the strip and magazine and flopping down in his seat in a decidedly graceless way. He heaved a sigh of frustration but stopped as all eyes once again turned to him.

Happy that he would certainly not be the centre of anyone's attention Oropher pressed his fist back to his lips and after one more furtive glance around the hall, gave it a tentative lick. It has a vaguely salty taste to it, he decided. He puffed up his cheeks for no real reason, before licking his fingers again. The thumb seems to taste saltier, he mused. Unfolding his hand he decided to taste every finger separately to test this theory.

And so it came to be that he almost missed the arrival of another. It was only when one elf to his left cursed loudly at the newcomer for disturbing his concentration after the seven thousand and eight hundred and fourth dot that Oropher looked up to see what was happening. The new comer ignored him and so did Oropher when he noticed who now was standing before him.

"Already munching on body parts? Your decline is a rapid one Oropher."

"Oh, you're here too." Precisely 0,04 seconds later the former King of Greenwood the Great wished he had said something less…stupid. It is this cursed place, his mind protested, yet it did not help his pride.

"Well," a pause, "Yes, I am." The elf folded his arms and tapped his foot. Oropher glanced around. The elf unnerved him and on top of that everyone was looking at them because talking was most certainly not appreciated. He rubbed his fingers against each other distractedly. At least he found no better comeback than I did, it was a comforting thought.

"Well, Gil-galad, I got here before you, for all you know you'll be eating you toes by the afternoon." Now this statement indicated clearly even Oropher had not wholly adapted to his new life, for there they had no means to measure time, and they most certainly did not know what year it was, let alone when it was afternoon.

"I'd expect a warmer welcome considering I walked 6 miles just to get here."

"Not to see me, surely? Well, I'd offer you a seat, but as you can see they are all taken." He made a circular motion with his arms and nearly hit the elf to his left who glared at him for distracting him from his count again.

"I'll just sit here then." Gil-galad declared as he pushed over a neat pile of magazines -mainly on gardening, though Oropher thought he remembered one on keeping birds- to make room to sit on the low, endlessly long table. It creaked and groaned and shook and Oropher felt sure every elf in a mile's radius was looking in their direction. He felt also extremely irked because he had put those magazines in order of dullness and had kept everyone away from them for the last 21 days with a viciousness unbecoming of elves –considering how most elves had ended up there, that meant a lot. On top, he remembered, there had been one called _Not Another Gardening Magazine_ which too was in fact a gardening magazine -on lissuin to be precise-, but at least the title had given him some hope and he had sometimes watched it, smiling while he thought of all the things that could have been in it. And now it was all lost, all those weeks thrown away, all a waste of time. Ai, he could have cried.

"I was in fact looking for the door out." Gil-galad spoke up again, drawing the former king's attention back to him rather than the ruined pile of paper.

"The way out is that way. But don't bother going there, you can't get through until it's your turn." Oropher first pointed to his right, then to the number on the elf's nametag. Gil-galad rolled his eyes.

"No matter how this place seems to effect some people," He vaguely waved his hand to the left where Oropher could make out an elf lying across the table while throwing little balls of paper to a sputtering candle on the chandelier , "_ I_ was quite able to deduce where the way out is and how the system works."

Oropher blinked and when he saw Gil-galad expected a comeback he kept blinking every two seconds till he was sure the other knew he wasn't going to say something.

"I just wished you to know that I most certainly didn't come to see _you_." He stressed that last word, but visibly grew irritated when he still received no response. Oropher suddenly felt like he hadn't had that much fun in a long time.

"I heard a rumour," Gil-galad tried again. He shifted his legs and caused the table to creak again. "I heard that next to the gate Miriel displays the number whose turn it is. I want to see how long I have to wait here."

Now Oropher felt it he owned it to Gil-galad –after all, the man might still have been alive if not for him- to help him out of his daydream. And so it was that, with many gestures and exasperation, Oropher told Gil-galad of a children's game he had seen some human younglings play some summers before his death, back when he had visited Esgaroth for an occasion he could not quite remember. In the game children would sit in a circle, or in a long line and one would whisper something in the ear of the one next to him and then the second one would whisper the same words to a third one and so on.

–At this point Gil-galad looked so impatient that Oropher genuinely considered going on until the seventieth child told the seventy-first one or even beyond that, but considering the glares that were already coming his way, he decided against it.-

"Then the last child would be asked to say the phrase out loud and it would be compared to the original message." He continued happily.

–Oropher took great care to vary the word he used and to speak slowly and loudly. To emphasise the point, he excused himself-

"And when compared it would become clear the words had been twisted to form something completely else." He declared as if it was the clue of Arda's greatest joke and expected applause to come his way. None came though.

"So, you see, Gil-galad? That's how it work here too," He truly felt like a teacher "you say you walked six miles already, and it is still days before you'd reach the gate, for all I know the original phrase would have been that Fëanor's wife refuses to shave her legs." Oropher watched the complete spectrum of emotions play across the other's face while absentmindedly wondering where that last part had come from. I don't remember having had something for hairy legs. Considering the last expression to _grace _Gil-galad's face before determination set in, was one of absurdity, the former king felt sure the other too found the thought on Nerdanel's hairy legs an odd one.

"Then at least I will have found some blackmail material to get some people to let me go first." Oropher wasn't sure that would work in any way, and judging by the pauses between the awkwardly spoken words Gil-galad didn't either. Not even his determined look could dispel that impression.

The elf lord jumped up from the low, endlessly long table, his intend to continue his quest for Nerdanel's legs was clear. Oropher was slightly disturbed that the increasingly strange images that filled his head failed to invoke any worry for his health. For good measure Gil-galad shoved the pile of magazines to the ground, earning many a gasp from many now wide awake elves, before running of down the hall like a petulant child, no doubt waking many more elves along the way. For a little while there was a buzz of sound threatening to develop, but it soon died down, when the sound of Gil-galad's heavy boots disappeared out of earshot.

Faintly the Sindarin elf wondered if perhaps he should have mentioned that it was Miril who lighted all the candles in the hall and could not possibly stand next to the gate. He knew that because he had asked her once after he had already talked to everyone else within a day's travel. Or maybe he should have warned him that walking was not at all appreciated and that the last elf to try it had almost been beaten to death –he would have been had it still been possible- after having walked thirty-eight miles. Remembering the mess the lord had made of his precious pile of magazines Oropher decided he didn't really care.

Oropher turned from staring after the retreating –or charging?- form to turn his sad gaze at the unorganized pile of paper on the ground. Most of them were on taking care of extinct plants and were in Avari so he could hardly understand a word, but still, they were his. And they were unorganized. Suddenly he became aware of the a pair of eyes gazing at him. When he looked up he saw that the elf who had previously been staring at his shoes had been roused from his stupor by Gil-galad and his talk and was now looking longing at N_ot Another Gardening Magazine_. A sudden fire swelled in Oropher and almost consumed him. He had to protect his manual on when to prune lissuin! It was his! When he heard the elf on his left reach the two hundredth dot, he jumped to action with such ferocity the newling across from him could only look on wide eyed while the former king collected his magazines. Oropher didn't really care, the elf would be in the same sate in a matter of year, or days, or however long it had been. He was too far gone to truly care. If only the Halls of Waiting didn't involve so much waiting.

Somewhere to his right an elf gave a shrill scream as an small bruning paper ball came falling down and the elf next to him cursed again as he lost count at 256. Just a few more years, hopefully.

* * *

_Every time I read 'Halls of Waiting' I imagine thousands of elves sitting along a very long table filled with magazines they're not in the least interested in but read anyway because there simply is nothing else. _

_Actually Namo is a shrink who will charge you way too much and spend not nearly enough time with you before releasing all the lost cases back in Arda. And Nienna is his assistant. :) _

_This wasn't spelling checked before posting, might do that later. _


End file.
